You may remember Service Corporation International, SCI, as it was part of the case against confirming Alberto Gonzales due to his involvement in the Texas and Florida scandals known as Funeralgate. As we covered back in February, Service Corporation International was "recycling" graves, removing the bodies that were there originally and throwing them in the woods to use the space to house new customers at two Jewish cemeteries in Florida . Service Corporation International, the world’s largest funeral service company, is headed by Robert Waltrip, a longtime friend and generous financial patron of the Bush family. Eliza May was head of the Texas Funeral Services Commission when it began receiving complaints about unlicensed embalmers, and sued when she was fired. Gonzales kept Bush from testifying in this case and was also under scrutiny when a memo surfaced that was sent to his office when he was Bush’s gubernatorial counsel. The memo suggested possible improprieties by two funeral commissioners with ties to SCI and Joeseph Allbaugh, Bush’s former chief of staff in Austin, 2000 presidential campaign manager, who now serves as director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). The case was suddenly settled in November 2001. The Menorah Gardens case in Florida, involving 72 families, was settled in Oct of 2004.

So, coincident with the emergence of happy talk and silver linings - Sure, it's bad, but New Orleans rescuers find fewer dead than feared - the duties of processing Louisiana's fresh kill is consigned to Bush Texas mafia with a criminal record including desecration of human remains, "recycling" graves and dumping bodies.

There is a deeply bizarre note to this, because to anyone who has paid attention to this slow-motion atrocity the bodies will be hidden in plain sight. (There is pointed irony, as well: in a bid at boosting government transparancy, China has justannounced that it will no longer treat death tolls from natural disasters as state secrets.) The arrival of SCI in New Orleans is like a shredder truck pulling up outside the offices of a crooked firm expecting a forensic audit. The evidence - the bodies that are still tied to lamp posts - could be going up in the smoke of one of the city's uncontained fires, or weighted down and dumped in the bayou. It's not unimaginable - SCI has already done this.

Can they hide all the dead? They're going to try to hide the living. The head of FEMA's housing effort, Brad Fair, says that 200,000 evacuees may need "temporary" shelter for five years.

Now why, rather than offer aid which could lead, with speed, to a permanent solution in accord with the wishes of survivors, has the government determined to withhold the financial assistance necessary to support self-determination, and is spending more - five years of even basic food and shelter add up - to deny them autonomy?

That's a scary question. The challenge to a long-disengaged populace: does it have the courage to ask, and maybe answer, scary questions?

your point doesn't really hold up, since, as in the case of Iraqi war dead (possibly deflated), the loved ones of victims know only 2 number: the official death toll and the number that matters them (loved ones lost). If the media say 2000 people died, how do they know that their loved on(s) isnt on that list of 2000? It is impossible to obtain an independant compilation without NUMEROUS omissions and fabrications being included. Therefor victims' survivors would have to find and peruse the appropriate documentation checking for their loved ones name (which almost all would assume was on their). Would you if you'd lost a loved one, when you might just as easily think yourself one of the unlucky few as would most of the other victims families.

Even if MANY people were to check and find out their loved one wasn't listed, they could EASILY be victimized and minized by the mainstream media. Stories of insurance and other kinds of fraud would be combined with a complete lack of mention of the number of complainers, were it large.

The mainstream media defines all socio-historico-political life for about 75% of Americans.

Will SCI obligingly process bodies as 'drowned' regardless of the real cause of death, say like bullet wounds, etc.? Isn't this really just a stupid question?Looks like they got the right outfit for the job.

This must be how it was in Germany. While everyone stayed quiet and dumb, the Nazis just took over.

But check this link quick before they change it. Bush is all 'aw shucks, no big, I take responsibilty'.http://www.msnbc.msn.com

Thank you once again Jeff for a very insightful commentary. I wish someone like Oprah could read this and believe it, because these findings need distribution widely. Astrologically speaking, from Stariq.com and writer Michael Wolfstar "Keep an eye on Oprah over the next month as transiting Mars opposes her own Mars. Mars turns retrograde on October 1 as it forms an exact opposition to her natal Mars. This Mars opposite Mars represents a highly charged confrontation, which will only increase over the next few weeks. Already she's expressed the influence, when she said about Katrina's aftermath: "This makes me so mad! This should not have happened."

Also check out the story on rawstory.com today about the Redcross basically being run by Homeland Security. The dirt on these people just keeps piling higher.

Bush is apoligizing today for the slow response in New Orleans. This must be the first time he has apologized for anything, seriously. The handlers must be very scared if they can get him to do that.

I doubt Oprah really cares about anything besides her own popularity and tv ratings. I am sure she know far more than you think. At best, she is one of these culpable 'pragmatists'. While truth and decency implode, she continues to lead the dance of self-interest and the phony, shallow appearance of 'sincerety'. Oprah is a symbol of America's sick culture.

Remember this clue Jesus gave:"For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."

I can't get over how Americans accept how the victims of Katrina are allowed to rot like road kill. This is the same culture that goes apeshit when a US serviceman or white citizen is killed - and no expense is spared to recover (and FAST) any remains.

I agree with Jeff or someone's post that a message is being given everybody: 'this is what we think you're worth - less than a family pet'.

With the population scattered to the winds, getting a list of the missing is going to be nearly impossible. The victims have been allowed to deteriorate so severly that rapid 'disposal' is going to happen, and everyone is going to nod that it's in everyone's interest that it happen so. The bungalows still underwater will be buldozed, before the bedrooms and attics can disgorge their horrible truths.

If the US can't and won't even pay attention to the totals of the Florida vote in 1999 done by the media, then the MM won't spend a dime in trying to piece together an accurate missing/presumed dead list. Maybe the NOT-P might...but the resources this would take, and the stonewalling it will face, would discourage most modern paper editors. Television...don't make me laugh...they won't even touch it. You'll see a European TV doc on the whole mess, with a pretty fair numeric assessment, before you see anything from the North American networks.

Repeating 'It's not as bad as some said' over and over is already having it's effect.

In a way it looks to have been another real-life experiment in social engineering, a study of mass consciousness. I can't help remembering the RAND Corp's experiments during Vietnam--indeed, I think the whole thing to them was a fascinating study in what we could take. Thus the five-day wait--send in FOX and watch us watching black people die like rats. In most countries without our "freedom", the government would ALREADY be overthrown by massive popular protests. This--like the DC Sniper episode--goes far beyond "manufacturing consent" and into the realm of "circumscribing reality" a la what CIA et al. have long been doing with Hollywod, the Media, and so forth.

As for lying about death tolls, when it comes to floods there are far more ways to massage the total than with wars. The death tolls given during the 1927 flood varied enormously, and though many thousands died, and this was accepted by much of the US pop. at the time, even Herbert Hoover wouldn't stoop as low as admitting it (and it got him elected). Death tolls from natural disasters of any type are always malleable.

perhaps there is a connection between the treatment of the newly evacuated and the drive to create more cities and policies that resemble Singapore's authoritarian-style capitalism. (i.e., remove the unproductive/undesirable people and neighborhoods and create a gated community of corporate bourgeois delights unencumbered by various unsightlies)bedfellows abound when the policy goal is super-strong property rights (banking, legal and military elite). those with an ownership stake are the only ones given a say in politics. the ruthless here find their freedom and social mobility while the others are left to do their bidding...

They are the 3 names that identify 3 bodies on American Airlines Flight 77 that was flown into the Pentagon by a man who couldn’t fly a plane.

The identifications were made by the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology (AFIP).

These are the names of 3 people who did NOT appear on the original AA passenger list – just like the 5 Arabs supposedly on board that plane whose photographs were published by the FBI on Sept 27th 2001. AA have refused to explain the discrepancy.

Getting rid of the bodies of the dead is one thing. Shutting up the living relatives of the dead is another.

Remember the US does like its sentimental memorials. You like to read out the names of every victim of 9/11, one by one.

When the time comes to erect the memorial to the NO flood what will happen when they omit the names of thousand of people who just happened to mysteriously disappear at exactly the same time from exactly the same place?

Surely for every one that disappeared 1 or 2 kin will surface to claim their relative has been omitted?

Massaging the numbers down will surely happen but can they really get away with it on a significant scale? If so, how?

Blanco said she has signed a contract with Kenyon International Emergency Services after the company threatened to pull out of the state because it had not yet signed a formal contract with FEMA.

Wonder why FEMA sent all those volunteers home when Kenyon hadn't even started recovering bodies yet?

Wonder if the new Homeland Security oversight of post-Katrina contracts has anything to do with FEMA's foot-dragging?

Wonder if Blanco has ever heard of funeralgate? Wonder if Blanco is being set up somehow? (Blanco has probably performed the best of any Katrina related officials, from what I've read, despite her earlier comments about the National Guard, back from Iraq, knowing how to use their weapons)

Jeebus, have you people NOT figured this out yet or do you need a slide rule?

The whole fucking POINT is to evacuate the area so that shanty towns, slums and tenements can be replaced by casinos, resort hotels, golf courses, tennis courts, shopping malls, restaurants and of course, private gated communities access to which will be restricted by toll roads.

They'll need about five years to do this, and in the process thwart any real effort by individuals to help themselves. READ WHY:http://www.lewrockwell.com/shaffer/shaffer118.html

What's truly pathetic is that the crass criminals who subjugate us under their unconstitutional and mutant socialist 'government' get to basically pull a Fallujah in the United Sates and have most of the people cheering the deaths and elimination of their own countrymen. As a proud nation we are most definitely finished.

Good Soviets cheered as bourgeoise Ukranians were deliberately starved to death in the 1920s. Good Germans cheered as 'Jewish criminal elements' were 'relocated' to the gas chambers. Not wanting to be left out of the evil empire roster, good Americans cheer as 'black criminals' suffer similar fates in New Orleans.

it's very suspicious. day 1, the count was 6K then went up to 20K then back down to 10K and then back down to 6K. and now it sits at 300-something? No way. The news showed the tractor trailer trucks going into the town they were using as mortuary staging on TV. they sure implied they were full and making round trips. And they brought in 25K body bags. The math is not right. None of it feels right. Ummmm not to seem inhuman or insensitive, but one would think 200 would have been lost to heart attacks alone. the mainstream media won't touch this will they?

This has GOTTA be one of the freakiest, chlliest post yet -- In combination with the deliberate holding of critical aid and rescue seemingly intended to provoke widespread rioting, perhaps fueled by 'volunteer' covert vigilante gangs taking potshots at 'looters' (re: reports of white armed youths in pickups -- were they agent provocateurs? This would explain the special police 'monitoring' the Superdome and Convention Center, and rescued survivors being dropped-off while refusing all aid), the contradictory 'official' stories of relief operations, the apparant failure to do emergency repairs on the levees, the huge influx of army and hired-guns doing little more than looking 'fierce', and the inexplicable leaving dead bodies lying uncollected for almost two weeks -- where even in war-torn Iraq the bodies are collected immediately (unless US snipers shoot and kill burial parties, as in Fallujah -- which shows how sick American foreign policy is) -- perhaps to make Identification impossible?

It seems nothing would be easier to severely undercount the true death toll, as there will probably be at least several-hundred to 1000 'unidentified' -- and an 'official' list will never be reconciled with reports of the missing.

God, this is SO incredibly foul and evil -- America's biggest enemies are now, and for some time have been, within out gates, in the highest positions of power -- and the police and troops for the most part are clueless, put to protecting property rights and the priveleged instead of human and civil rights.

I have to agree with whoever said that the 'message' being given is, "This is what we think of you -- Less than a family pet!'

Some ironic lesson here alright, showing the lies and contradictions and true horror of what the American Dream has become under a government corrupted by greed and abuse of power -- when some 60,000 armed troops are needed to wage war against minority-class desperate survivors a storm and criminal neglect couldn't kill.

word has it that mercenaries from black-something are now on duty for $350 a day in NOLA...the same company that was/is in iraq. who is paying them? and why? if your report, and the tens of thousands of similar reports flying around the world have any basis in reality, we are doomed. or very, very stupid. or both.

1. Separate and disperse survivors so that no one can say for years exactly how many really survived.

2. Cover up the numbers of the dead.

3. Keep the survivors gone so long that they lose claim to any property.

4. Institute a standard of proof so rigorous that the vast majority of survivors will never be able to establish the right to their own property again.

5. Make survivors sign away their rights to appeal in exchange for help.

6. Emminent Domain the rest.

Anyone who doubts the murderous intent of this administration should check out the White House website that shows the Federally declared disaster area of Louisiana. It includes the whole state except New Orleans, the part that voted Democratic.

They HAVE to bury the number of dead, or Chimpy is FINISHED. When people find out the death toll is in the TENS OF THOUSANDS there will be riots in the streets that will make the French Revolution seem like a children's party.

For some reason,I was fascinated by the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and read a number of books on it when I was growing up in the 60's (I'm 52 now).The death toll I always read was 700.It wasn't until the 1980's that I saw a toll of 3000,and I had actually seen one figure of 300.It was only in the last 5 years that I've read anything that discusses the probable toll.An article claimed that do to pressure by the Business community of SF who didn't want the city's reputation to be tarnished and thus their fortunes diminished,they had set a figure of 700.Which was off by at least a factor of 10,and the real toll was probably something like 10,000.Given the fact it was an 8.6 and the technology of the day and the fact that the quake struck when people were either still in bed or just getting dressed,yeah 700 seems ridiculously low.Hmmm,maybe the fire was set or at least seriously helped along so that the bodies couldn't be recovered.Remember during the Tsunami,their were figures being given out daily.Here it took a week before we heard anything and then 3-4 days before it went from 50 up to 80.Can you mention ANY natural disaster in the last 25 years or more where something like this happened?

The First Amendment is dead and gone. Protestors are shunted off into invisible "free speech zones" or illegally arrested.

The Second Amendment is dead and gone. Private guns for hire are confiscating guns lawfully owned by American citizens.

The Third Amendment is dead and gone. Militia, National Guard and members of armed forces can now enter and take over your home

The Fourth (freedom from unreasonable police action), Fifth (freedom from self-incrimination) and Sixth Amendments (right to counsel) are dead, killed by the "Patriot" Act and buried by complicit judges who will be rewarded with SCOTUS seats (Roberts got his nod by approving Chimpy's Imperial Presidency and the Fourth Circuit is sure to lose one of its own to SCOTUS as a reward for the horrendous Padilla decision -- one that rubber-stamps with approval an authoritarian regime modeled after Hitler's Nazis, reich here in the U.S.of A.

The Seventh Amendment is well on its way to being dead and gone: The "tort" reform is guaranteed to keep poor victims of corporate crime out of court, which is slowly but surely being closed to all but rich white folk.

The Eighth Amendment against cruel and unusual punishment? Don't make me laugh, this has been ritualistically ignored by prison overseers, fresh from their days as slave overseers, who make inflicting pain and misery a career...so much so, they have been engaged to do it all over at Gitmo and Abu Garaib...former U.S. policies against torture are now "quaint."

The Ninth Amendment (preserving the soverignty of states)-- BEING KILLED BEFORE YOUR VERY EYES. The topic of this latest GOP talking point. Denounce the local government and bambozzle the sheeple into giving up on it, finally approving a centralized "streamlined" government run of course by the incompetent sociopaths currently in charge.

The Tenth Amendment preserving the right of the people (HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA) You gave that up when you elected these criminals.

The democrats, the eternal "Lucy" to progressives' "Charley Brown" will again yank the football away, annointing Chieft Justice "I Vill Endorse Ze Police State For Imerialism" Roberts, then that clown on the Fourt Circuit who carried the Chimp's water on his prosecutition without any cause of American citizens,thereby finaly rubber-stamping the Executive's complete overthrow, evisceration, erasure and destruction of the U.S. constitution.

But Jeff, you don’t have any PROOF of that! Why, I , a two time Nader voter, was just over at bushismyhero.com and I saw PROOF that you are wrong! Rush O’Drudge and Savage Hitchens said so! Why are you people always talking about Satan, there is no such thing as Satan. Sheesh. Get a life.

Sure we messed up, but if you go too far in saying that we messed up, you will dishonor/discredit all the hard work being done by the rescuers.

This is almost the same as... Sure it was a mistake to go to war with Iraq, but you can't take this argument too far or you will begin to dishonor/discredit all the young men and women risking and giving their lives for our freedom.

It is a line that has proven to work. He's got Laura feeding us the same line:

"We've seen terrible, terrible things and we've seen unbelievably unselfish acts of giving as well by communities all across the United States and, of course, many more unselfish acts of giving than bad things," she said in a speech Tuesday to the conservative Heritage Foundation. "Maybe the media hasn't shown us that much, but we've read about it and we do know about it."

It's a very clever tactic (I'm not suggesting he is the source, he has an entire superpower's resources to pay for the PR bill). It equates the viewpoint that there were unbelievable and unforgivable mistakes completely with the forsaking of the "selfless heroes".

Now here I thought I was about as cynical as you can get about what the other side is capable of, and yet when I saw the headline this morning about Blanco having the state sign the Kenyon contract because she was tired of the federal footdragging, I thought this was a Good Thing. Then I get here and thanks to Jeff's research on Kenyon, I feel like I got punk'd.

The last few days I've been thinking, they say first expectation was 60K casualties, then they settled on 10K, but the actual CONFIRMED number was hovering at 200. (The story about the hospital by the way started out with dozens of dead, then 30, then 40 now 45...I watched the toll go up all day yesterday on AP.)

Now, unless you are assuming that every single person who said they saw bodies were seeing the same bodies, you know, like those same vases that got carted around by the Baghdad looters...you've got anecdotally more than a couple of hundred. Yes, it had occurred to me that the goal was to conceal the actual numbers and massively lowball them. I just didn't realize there was an outfit you could just get on the old cell and say "Kenyon? Hi, I've got thousands of dead people, can you make them disappear?" and they'd say "No problemo, keemo sabe." I didn't see how they could get away with it...now I do.

Several stories ago, I related how the way the Nazi "eugenics" (as in euthanasia) program began to get out was simply people comparing notes, in that pre-Internet, locked down media era...Johann's stroked out granny was relocated to a private hospital in remote Schnitzelbaden and then they got a letter granny had, regrettably, passed on from pneumonia...but look, Ilsa's retarded nephew was relocated to a private hospital in remote Schnitzelbaden and they she got a letter he had, regrettably, passed on from pneumonia...and then, would you believe it? That poor crazy little Schmidt boy who had the breakdown last year...HE got relocated to a private hospital in remove Schnitzelbaden and...

Zwei und zwei ist fier!

I don't doubt they're going to try it. And I agree that the next of kin in many cases is not going to be the sort of folks that New Jersey yuppie stockbrokers had who would pitch a fit if their relatives had just been dumped in a mass grave, or they'd never heard anything at all. Some of those unable to evacuate probably HAD no other family--if they had the family would have hocked the silverware to get them a bus ticket out of town before Katrina blew into town.

Ah, shite and double shite.

By the way, I read an excellent interview yesterday with a French guy who wrote a book about the US possibly ending up in a Soviet Style collapse; see:

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/091205H.shtml

Emmanuel Todd: The Specter of a Soviet-Style Crisis by Marie-Laure Germon and Alexis Lacroix in Le Figaro, translated by Leslie Thatcher.

Call it my being 1/4 French, but as I read I thought "Well, the buggers deserve it" and then near the end I'm like, Whoa there, I'm not sitting at some sidewalk cafe in the City of Light sipping a pastis and telling one of mes amis "Ha! 'Freedom fries', eh! Vous vous en fichez, l'Amerique!" I'm sitting about midway between the San Andreas and Hayward faults 40 miles south of Frisko, in Schwarzeneggerbaden, not yet in a hospital about to expire of "pneumonia"...in short, as the 'fichez-ing' continues to happen I'm high on the list of those likely to be fichez-ed next.

The collapse of a society, when viewed from one' study while reading Spengler or Gibbon or Shirer, and the view as you're just one more turd circling around in the bowl, are equines of vastly different hues. I've long said "History is not a spectator sport" yet on some level, I realized I hoped at best I could escape it all together ("Yes yes, we'll miss dear old America, who else would have thought to put cheese slices named after her in individual plastic packets? Now, whose deal was it?" or at worst be camped out on the beach like the end of, well, "On The Beach" (in La France the title is "Le Dernier Rivage"--"The Last Shore" which I think gets the message over better.)

This is one "Media Craptacular" I would be happy to turn down front-and-center seats for. Maybe I could trade them in for a Karagoz show in Kapadokia? You know there are underground cities there up to 14 stories, able to hide up to 10,000 people, where the early Christians took refuge from persecution. Nah, too claustrophobic. Let's go back to the beach idea...New Zealand, where the hobbits live.

Not wanting to be left out of the evil empire roster, good Americans cheer as 'black criminals' suffer similar fates in New Orleans.

Actually, I have experienced nothing of the kind. I have seen extreme concern, people wringing themselves out to help others that they don't know, people opening their homes and lives and wallets to strangers in need.

I don't know who you hang around with, but I suggest you find better friends.

Being one who evacuated from The New Orleans metro area, I know for a fact of the bodies that were here. I know there are going to be at least 30,000 dead (just from Plaquemine Parish). Bush needs low numbers so he won't FINALLY be lynched. He will GET his low numbers. TRUST ME.

WAKEMAN, Ohio - The 11 children removed from a house where authorities say some of them slept in homemade cages are polite, well-behaved, well-dressed and appear to have been well-fed, neighbors and authorities said Tuesday.

Their adoptive parents, Michael Gravelle, 56, and Sharen Gravelle, 57, denied in a custody hearing Monday that they abused or neglected the children, who are ages 1 to 14 and have conditions that included autism and fetal alcohol syndrome.

No charges had been filed as of Tuesday afternoon, and messages left with the couple’s lawyer were not immediately returned.

...Children in foster homesNo one answered the Gravelles’ door Tuesday, and the gray, four-bedroom house was dark. A pig, roosters and other animals shared the yard outside Wakeman, a city of about 1,000 people 50 miles west of Cleveland.

The children have been placed with four foster families and were doing well, said Erich Dumbeck, director of the Huron County Department of Job and Family Services.

“We’re still trying to figure out what happened in that home. We don’t have any indication at this point that there was any abuse,” Dumbeck said.

I forgot to add, I left sunday 1am before Katrina hit on monday am. I had the means, ability and place to go that allowed me to do this. There were tens of thousands of people who were unable to for financial reasons. Now, even Republicans here are re-thinking their devotion to the Republican Party and many, most of them friends of mine, have said they will NEVER vote republican again. The FEMA people who are in front of the hospital I work for, yes I am back, are refusing to wear their FEMA badges and hide them in their pocket.

Hmmm...so the day after we are told the death toll will be really low, they go and hire an outside funeral company? Do these guys not talk to each other or do they intentionally do contradictory things just to mess with whoever is paying attention?

A coroner team makes a stop in the Seventh Ward of New Or... A National Guardsman from Oklahoma holds a gate open as F...

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Hurricane Katrina

COMPLETE COVERAGE

PHOTO GALLERY

HOW TO HELP

LOCAL FUNDRAISERS

Charges in nursing home deaths

La. death toll at 423

Bush takes responsibility for blunders

As bodies recovered, reporters are told 'no photos, no stories'

After water recedes, the detritus of disaster emerges

Quilters' patchwork relief effort

45 bodies found inside New Orleans hospital

Canine teams sought survivors

FEMA chief resigns, but criticism goes on

1,000 chickens that rode out the storm now escape the frying pan

Pender: Assessing Katrina's impact

Insurance premiums may rise after Katrina

New Orleans -- A long caravan of white vans led by an Army humvee rolled Monday through New Orleans' Bywater district, a poor, mostly black neighborhood, northeast of the French Quarter.

Recovery team members wearing white protective suits and black boots stopped at houses with spray painted markings on the doors designating there were dead bodies inside.

Outside one house on Kentucky Street, a member of the Army 82nd Airborne Division summoned a reporter and photographer standing nearby and told them that if they took pictures or wrote a story about the body recovery process, he would take away their press credentials and kick them out of the state.

"No photos. No stories," said the man, wearing camouflage fatigues and a red beret.

On Saturday, after being challenged in court by CNN, the Bush administration agreed not to prevent the news media from following the effort to recover the bodies of Hurricane Katrina victims.

But on Monday, in the Bywater district, that assurance wasn't being followed. The 82nd Airborne soldier told reporters the Army had a policy that requires media to be 300 meters -- more than three football fields in length -- away from the scene of body recoveries in New Orleans. If reporters wrote stories or took pictures of body recoveries, they would be reported and face consequences, he said, including a loss of access for up-close coverage of certain military operations.

Dean Nugent, of the Louisiana State Coroner's Department, who accompanied the soldier, added that it wasn't safe to be in Bywater. "They'll kill you out here," he said, referring to the few residents who have continued to defy mandatory evacuation orders and remain in their homes."

"The cockroaches come out at night," he said of the residents. "This is one of the worst places in the country. You should not be here. Especially you," he told a female reporter.

Nugent, who is white, acknowledged he wasn't personally familiar with the poor, black neighborhood, saying he only knew of it by reputation.

Later Monday, the recovery team collected a body from a green house on St. Anthony Street in nearby Seventh Ward. The dead man, who was slipped into a black body bag and carried out to one of the white vans, had been lying alone on the living room floor for nearly two weeks, neighbors said.

"I told them weeks ago he was in there," said Barry Dominguez, 39, who lives across the street and has refused to leave the neighborhood he grew up in.

After the recovery team took away the St. Anthony Street body, two workers urinated on the side of a neighbor's house.

The CNN suit was in response to comments Friday at a news conference in which officials from the Federal Emergency Management Agency said members of the news media would not be allowed to witness the recovery of hurricane victims' bodies.

Terry Ebbert, New Orleans' homeland security director, had said Friday that the recovery effort would be done with dignity, "meaning that there would be no press allowed." Army Lt. Gen. Russell Honore later said there would be zero access to the recovery operation.

During a hearing Saturday morning in U.S. District Court in Houston, a lawyer who represented the government said FEMA had revised its previous plans to limit coverage.

Government agencies may still refuse requests from members of the media to ride along, or be "embedded," on recovery boats as crews gather the dead. "But, to the extent the press can go out to the locations, they're free to do that," said Keith Wyatt, an assistant U.S. attorney, according to a transcript of the hearing. "They're free to take whatever pictures they can take."

Army Lt. Col. Richard Steele said the government's position as explained in court Saturday didn't represent a change in policy. Reporters can watch recovery efforts they come upon, but they won't be embedded with search teams.

"We're not going to bar, impede or prevent" the media from telling the story, he said. "We're just not going to give the media a ride."

News Report, C. Stone Brown,Imdiversity, Sep 11, 2005The early news headlines for Hurricane Katrina highlighted some black New Orleans residents "taking" goods from businesses. Days later, the coverage shifted from "looting" to sympathetic coverage of black evacuees and criticism of President Bush and the Federal Emergency Management Agency. But despite the constant media coverage, Native Americans have become Katrina's forgotten victims.

Native American tribes that stretch across the Gulf States of Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi affected by the wrath of Hurricane Katrina largely have been ignored.

"What we are hearing is there has been no contact or minimum contact with most of the tribes," said Robert Holden, National Congress of American Indians (NCAI), who estimates there are several thousand Native Americans living in the hurricane's path. But like other news accounts regarding the dead, there are no firm numbers on the death toll.

What we do know is there are at least six federally recognized tribes located in Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi. They include the Poarch Band Creek in Alabama, Coushatta India Tribe, Jena Band of Choctaw and Tunica-Biloxi Tribe in Louisiana, and the Chitimacha Tribe and the Choctaw Indians in Mississippi.

Although communications with the tribes has been very limited, Holden said there was one particular tribal area near in Chalmette, La., that had a gruesome story. "This tribal representative said they were using Chalmette High School as a morgue. Evidently, they are in proximity to New Orleans, and they have heard from no one in five or six days."

i love stories like that, reminds me of two pigs that escaped from and abbatoir in england and led the workers and police on a whole day chase, dubbed 'butch cassidy and the sundance pig', when they were caught they were spared the abbatoir out of some sort of respect for their defiance and independence

Off topic, is your reference to the Peter Greenaway film? The Michael Nyman score is one of my all time favorite soundtracks. Don't like Greenaway though. "The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover" is one of the worst films I've ever seen, any film that can make both sex AND food unappealing has a certain claim to fame. No disrespect meant to her acting, but I could have lived a long and happy life without ever seeing Helen Mirren nekkid (I'm a 53 year old dumpy woman so that is not a sexist/ageist remark...I said the same thing about Mel Gibson's flabby rump in "Braveheart.")

Couple of articles on how DHS (the people who took millions in tax money to come up with "buy a lot of duct tape"): first one just out from Knight Ridder saying Chertoff the Jerkoff screwed up. Here's the lead:

WASHINGTON - The federal official with the power to mobilize a massive federal response to Hurricane Katrina wasHomeland Security SecretaryMichael Chertoff, not the former FEMA chief who was relieved of his duties and resigned earlier this week, federal documents reviewed by Knight Ridder show."

On last night's Nightline, FEMA staffer Leo Bosner appeared, careful to say he was giving his personal views, not the agency's official ones. He spoke quietly but did not mince words:

"Right now as we talk, unfortunately, Homeland Security is actually impeding - in my view - impeding the rescue effort. As I mentioned, we're running a 24/7 operation down there and we're trying to do the best we can at FEMA. And we're getting held back because we're bombarded with telephone calls, day and night, from Homeland Security, saying, `Oh, Secretary Chertoff has a press conference coming up, uh, stop everything and get us this information: Can you tell us exactly how many pounds of ice have been delivered to such and such county,' or, `Why are the number of rescues different from what they were six hours ago?' They're impeding the effort right now."

Below: some of the strongest whistleblowing I've ever seen on Nightline.Update [2005-9-14 1:21:56 by Levity]: While this is hot at dKos today, no one in the mainstream media has picked it up yet - not even ABC News online. You may want to contact your favorite paper, reporter or columnist.

This is all the more impressive because Leo Bosner is very low key and credible, with 26 years emergency experience, as he answered Nightline's questions. About Michael Brown's new replacement as FEMA director:"I've never met Chief Paulison. I've heard good things about him. He's a former Fire Chief. As far as I know he's the only top executive at FEMA who does have an emergency management background. I don't think it really resolves a lot of the long term problems at FEMA, but it's a good first step."

"Unless things get cleaned up pretty soon, a lot more FEMA employees are going to be retiring or leaving in the next few months. ...We're in this mission because we care about trying to protect lives and property in disasters. We've been pushed aside by Mr. Chertoff and Homeland Security, who've drained our staff and drained our budget, and now our leadership doesn't even seem to understand what a catastrophic plan is."

"As far as the politicalization, that's been something that baffles me. I'm not a politician, I'm a civil servant. And Democrats and Republicans alike in their ranks have plenty of well-qualified people to do these jobs. But instead we pick Congressmen who haven't won re-election - college friends of college friends - and it's starting to show."

Bosner has been speaking out quietly for weeks. On September 2nd, he politely explained that FEMA director Michael Brown, who finally resigned yesterday, is "a nice guy, very caring and sincere... I don't think he has the qualifications for the job."

But Brown's incompetence and his departure represent just the tip of the iceberg, and replacing him will solve very little. Let's hope while Bush suddenly starts "taking responsibility," Bosner doesn't receive the administration's usual whistleblower treatment - a demotion or other attack.

Final question to Bosner: Are you an optimist or a pessimist about the future of FEMA?Long thoughtful pause:"Well, you're asking me to look into the future. I would hope, I would hope that the administration would realize they need to take this seriously, make FEMA an independent agency, and put someone in charge who has an emergency background. If they do that, I can be an optimist. If not - I'll take my retirement."

You can point reporters to a transcript here if they need more documentation.

The reason they can 'hide' the Iraqi death toll is because virtually no one in America gives a fuck how many Iraqis are killed.

American lefties, righties, inbetweenies are all united in their shared belief that an American life is worth countless foreigners. Some things at least will never change.

This is evidenced by the countless articles which cite the 1800+ dead soldiers and then fail to mention a single Iraqi death. Look out for it, it happens all the time. And these articles are typically written by someone who opposes the neocons.

Also evidenced by the fact that no one in mainstream USA was really that upset with George until his negligence casued the death of ????? Americans in NO.

In fact if I am correct the US does not even bother to count the Iraqi dead.

But hang on, maybe Piano b was making the point about the American death toll in Iraq and not the Iraqi one?

Hello you guys,I believe they can't get away with lying about the body count if there is a concerted effort to create a clearinghouse type thing for families/survivors to report anyone missing in NOLA to. That way you could have an independent body working on the issue of who died and who didn't. I know the people in NOLA were poor, but they had families who would know of them. There has to be some sort of way to put families in touch with each other. The internet could be a great tool for this. WE can't just let the government send people into a black hole. And the families need to have some solidarity.

If someone could set up a site where people can resgister their missing perosns (related to the NO disaster) it could then be used as a control total to check against the 'official' dead and missing numbers.

The only challenge would be getting enough publicity for it to achieve take off velocity.

There is a reason why the survivors of Katrina are spread far and wide around the U.S.

I have read three reports of survivors being held in places that could be considered detainee centers. One in Colorado, one in Utah and one in Oklahoma. The one in Colorado is surrounded by barbed and razor wire.

I have also read that the number of war dead is being covered-up as well. The families of the war dead are also scattered around the country. They are informed of their loved-one's death, but how do they know if their dead son or daughter is on the official list? They don't.

Nothing will stop this horror except the impeachment and imprisonment of all those responsible for the disasters in the U.S. and Iraq! That is also the only way to honor those who have died as a result of the action and non-actions of this totally corrupt administration!

I think the members or Congress are too fat, dumb, lazy, and cowardly to take action. They are probably cowed by the thought of getting Wellstoned if they start stirring the pot for impeachment.

They could solve this mess if they wanted too. They don't need smoking gun memos or any rigorous incriminating evidence of high crimes to impeach. They can impeach just because they don't think the job is getting done right. By not impeaching, they are abrogating the trust and responsibility placed with them, and so they share in the culpability, by giving willing consent.Bush doesn't veto, and they don't impeach, and the media doesn't report, and the people don't think, question or protest.

Oh God said to Abraham, "Kill me a son" Abe says, "Man, you must be puttin' me on" God say, "No." Abe say, "What ?" God say, "You can do what you want Abe, but The next time you see me comin' you better run" Well Abe says, "Where do you want this killin' done ?" God says. "Out on Highway 61".

Off topic, yes it is. Though I'm not particularly fond of it. My favourite Greenaway film is A Zed and Two Noughts. Brutal philosophical farce, like much of his work. The Pillow Book was quite good, too.

One place to check for figures on deaths is the Social Security Death Index. This is far from complete, since the only deaths required to be reported to Social Security are those of people receiving payments, but it will still be interesting to see if the figures go up for August/September.

I checked recently and got the following totals for peoploe whose last residence was in Louisiana:

March 3109Apr 2692May 2776Jun 2471July 1465

Since the July figure is obviously partial, I'd say there is typically an eight-week lag for names to go up. That means that some time in early November, it should be possible to find out if there's a glaring spike in deaths.

A genealogy site called Rootsweb has the best interface for searching the SSDI. You can narrow it down to particular counties and even towns. You can only search by month, not by day, but most of the entries do specify the exact date of death.

I'd really like to see someone set up a website called something like whoarethedead.com to draw together information from every possible source in the attempt to create as complete as possible a list of the dead. Most of these people have to be on record somewhere -- voter registrations, welfare roles, school records -- and though it could take a while, given some good grassroots distributed networking, it should be possible to compile a memorial list.

There is NO SCREW UP IN NEW ORLEANS! IF things are bad there, it is completely deliberate. "Nothing in politics is accidental. If something happens, you can be sure it was planned that way." -Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

A previous poster stated that the situation was allowed to deteriorate to provide and excuse for military intervention and to have the people demand this intervention. That assessment was spot on the money.

There are armed Mexican troops ringing the state of Louisiana according to Alex Jones, along with contingents setting up shop in San Antonio. Considering that Bush just signed a 'North American Union' series of agreements with Canada and Mexico, anyone with half a brain left should be awash in red flags.

The Bushites know, like the nazi's knew, the BIGGER the lie, the more people will believe it. Chertoff, NOT Brown is responsible for the late and insufficient response. Write to your congresscritters and representatives and demand impeachment and imprisonment immediately. Links to congress and house on my site.

About the armed Mexicans--what are they there for? I heard one group went to San Antonio with aid for the evacuees there. Are they armed to keep evacuees out of Mexico? Please elaborate. I'm not getting this one.

What about sending a group of people in black to stand in front of the White House like the Mothers of the Disappeared do in Buenos Aires? I just read that the Senate put the kibosh on a bipartisan Katrina panel. BushCo did their best to stonewall the 9/11 panel, then tried to put Kissinger in charge--the 9/11 widows kept after them.

Not that the McKean Commission wasn't rigged, of course.

At this point I have to wonder. These Commissions--with the Warren Commission as the granddaddy--generally end up being whitewashes, oh yes it was just that lone nut...however a lot of good info does come out, however much it is buried in huge reports, and never picked up by the media (this was true even of the Warren Commission.)

Is it better to have an imperfect, stage managed Commission, or none at all?

Sometimes you really do have to change tactics.

What if...the 'good guys' just said, OK. Congress is a bunch of nestfeathering crooks on both sides of the aisle, why give them photo ops and grandstands? Start an independent commission. Sure, it doesn't have subpoena power, but there are FOIA requests and possibly state open government laws (OK maybe not in the south, I'm in CA where there is a Public Records Act and many cities have similar ordinances). There are also in this case a lot of passionately angry people who would happily testify.

Why not expose the Congress for what it is, evil GOP and Quisling Dumbos, useless in pursuit of either truth or justice?

Ladies and gentlemen, to Gerry Ford after Nixon quit, the system DOES NOT WORK.

The Net, blogs, have been a work around because the mass media didn't work anymore. Maybe it's time to have a Peoples' Commission.

I am thinking it was Thomas Kuhn in "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions" who said that scientific thought doesn't change because one group convinces another, but because the adherents of the old line of thought pass away and the new generation takes the new view. We are never going to take back a Congress that is full of the jokers who are in this one. It cannot be done. We can do our best next year to vote in new people (and to police the electoral process to make sure the votes are cast and counted). But right now, Congressional oversight of the Executive (and from what I'm hearing about the Roberts hearing, Judicial) Branch is FUBAR.

We have to think anew.

That's what the founders of this country did. They kept asking THEIR Mad King George (who at least had an excuse, he had syphilis) for redress of grievances and got bubkis. Finally they said "You know what? If you won't fix it--WE WILL."

This is the only way that can have any integrity. It still may not bring out the whole truth or bring justice to all who deserve it--it still will bring more, even the EFFORT to do it will bring more, than turning yet again to a corrupt system, like a battered woman slinking home from the shelter to give the batterer 'another chance.'

Last night I was watching "Law and Order SVU" (or SUV as I call it, being dyslexic), a decent story about the army covering up adverse reactions to a malaria drug. It had particular resonance in the scene where the young Assistant DA, Miss Novak, argues with the DA about whether the army would DELIBERATELY cover such a thing up, because the DA is played by Fred Dalton Thompson--former Republican Senator and currently in charge of vetting the Roberts selection process. The DA argues Novak is talking 'conspiracy theory', snaps maybe she wants to call in a US attorney to investigate them under RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations act)...she says hmm, maybe not a bad idea. Anyway, she pursues the matter and convenes a grand jury. At the hearing the army doctor who is to be her star witness recants and says the drug is safe and the adverse effects could have been from something else. She is flabbergasted and accosts him on the courthouse steps, asking if he was intimidated, telling him if only he had stuck to the testimony he had been supposed to give he could have made a difference, saved lives, forced the army to change its policy.

He is a man about my age, early 50s perhaps. He looks at her sadly and says "Miss Novak, you are very young. That is not how the world works."

That struck a deep chord with me, because I both agree and disagree with him. It is not how the world USUALLY works, it is not how those in power generally ALLOW the world to work.

However, while he may suspect what would have happened if he had testified truthfully--the army would have destroyed his career, suborned the investigation process, continued to stonewall, in the end the deaths would continue--HE DID NOT KNOW THAT.

You miss 100% of the shots you do not take.

As a fallible human being myself, I can't say that this man is a bastard for failing to offer himself and his career as a sacrifice on the very slim chance that it would bear fruit. One can say that that is the ethical thing to do (even that as a doctor he had a LEGAL obligation to do it since his Hippocratic Oath says "First do no harm.") But the only person one can put under a stricture to make such a sacrifice is...oneself.

If he had done so, however, perhaps a real investigative journalist would have dug into it, someone like Gary Webb. Perhaps other doctors would have spoken out, as happened when the first doctors began revealing the connection of fen-phen and heart damage, each new revelation spawning another. Eventually the tide of truth might simply have been too strong to be contained.

All that was being asked, actually, was that the army give an informational booklet detailing possible side effects to their soldiers! The same thing we all take for granted at the pharmacy (though few of us read the info) when we pick up a prescription. As a private citizen you would be told the drug might in a small percentage of cases cause brain stem damage or suicidal/homicidal behavior. Informed consent. As a private in the army, you would not be told.

At any rate, absent individuals willing to tell THEIR OWN LITTLE PIECE OF THE TRUTH, regardless of the consequences to them, the truth cannot come out. If on the other hand each person tells...writes...photographs...circulates...shouts on the street corner their truth (a process that blogging is part of but not sufficient in itself), the big picture of truth WILL emerge.

Then the realy hard part starts--now that we know what really happened and is happening still, what can, must, we do about it?

We often hear the comforting Biblical saying, "Ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make ye free."

It may do so. But equally true is what Kafka (I think) said: "Truth is a tiger in the streets." No telling who will get eaten rather than freed.

Still, in my opinion, striving after truth is better than settling for living with lies. Not 'better' in terms of making you happier or richer or more successful. Ask any whistleblower about THAT. Better morally, better for the individual soul and for the society as a whole.

Ours has been sunk for many years in lies and active collusion with lies and silent acquiescence to lies and active collusion and silence about all the lyin' and the colludin' and the acquiescin' and it is fucking time to have done with the lies, to stop living by and with them in our private lives and our public lives, and to expose, defeat, and hound from public life anyone who continues to contribute to the United States of Bullshit we live in.

Or we might as well each just put a bullet through our brains, a short sharp shock and then it's over, because the pain, the horror, of continuing to live lies and live with lies is not one anyone sane would want to pay.

The motto of my Irish family is "Lucent in Tenebris"--shining in the darkness. We all need to get out our little flashlights, candles, matches...do a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves and of the people around us, our own little Truth Commission, as well as a Truth Commission on a national scale. Shine lights under all the rocks whether you find them in your own heart or in the garden at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

A. E. Housman wrote,

"Here, on the level sand,Between the sea and land,What shall I build or writeAgainst the fall of night?"

NEW ORLEANS -- Heavily armed paramilitary mercenaries from the Blackwater private security firm, infamous for their work in Iraq, are openly patrolling the streets of New Orleans. Some of the mercenaries say they have been "deputized" by the Louisiana governor; indeed some are wearing gold Louisiana state law enforcement badges on their chests and Blackwater photo identification cards on their arms. They say they are on contract with the Department of Homeland Security and have been given the authority to use lethal force. Several mercenaries we spoke with said they had served in Iraq on the personal security details of the former head of the US occupation, L. Paul Bremer and the former US ambassador to Iraq, John Negroponte.

"This is a totally new thing to have guys like us working CONUS (Continental United States)," a heavily armed Blackwater mercenary told us as we stood on Bourbon Street in the French Quarter. "We're much better equipped to deal with the situation in Iraq."

Blackwater mercenaries are some of the most feared professional killers in the world and they are accustomed to operating without worry of legal consequences. Their presence on the streets of New Orleans should be a cause for serious concern for the remaining residents of the city and raises alarming questions about why the government would allow men trained to kill with impunity in places like Iraq and Afghanistan to operate here. Some of the men now patrolling the streets of New Orleans returned from Iraq as recently as 2 weeks ago.

What is most disturbing is the claim of several Blackwater mercenaries we spoke with that they are here under contract from the federal and Louisiana state governments.

Blackwater is one of the leading private "security" firms servicing the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan. It has several US government contracts and has provided security for many senior US diplomats, foreign dignitaries and corporations. The company rose to international prominence after 4 of its men were killed in Fallujah and two of their charred bodies were hung from a bridge in March 2004. Those killings sparked the massive US retaliation against the civilian population of Fallujah that resulted in scores of deaths and tens of thousands of refugees.

As the threat of forced evictions now looms in New Orleans and the city confiscates even legally registered weapons from civilians, the private mercenaries of Blackwater patrol the streets openly wielding M-16s and other assault weapons. This despite Police Commissioner Eddie Compass' claim that "Only law enforcement are allowed to have weapons."

Officially, Blackwater says it forces are in New Orleans to "join the Hurricane Relief Effort." A statement on the company's website, dated September 1, advertises airlift services, security services and crowd control. The company, according to news reports, has since begun taking private contracts to guard hotels, businesses and other properties. But what has not been publicly acknowledged is the claim, made to us by 2 Blackwater mercenaries, that they are actually engaged in general law enforcement activities including "securing neighborhoods" and "confronting criminals."

That raises a key question: under what authority are Blackwater's men operating? A spokesperson for the Homeland Security Department, Russ Knocke, told the Washington Post he knows of no federal plans to hire Blackwater or other private security. "We believe we've got the right mix of personnel in law enforcement for the federal government to meet the demands of public safety." he said.

But in an hour-long conversation with several Blackwater mercenaries, we heard a different story. The men we spoke with said they are indeed on contract with the Department of Homeland Security and the Louisiana governor's office and that some of them are sleeping in camps organized by Homeland Security in New Orleans and Baton Rouge. One of them wore a gold Louisiana state law enforcement badge and said he had been "deputized" by the governor. They told us they not only had authority to make arrests but also to use lethal force. We encountered the Blackwater forces as we walked through the streets of the largely deserted French Quarter. We were talking with 2 New York Police officers when an unmarked car without license plates sped up next to us and stopped. Inside were 3 men, dressed in khaki uniforms, flak jackets and wielding automatic weapons. "Y'all know where the Blackwater guys are?" they asked. One of the police officers responded, "There are a bunch of them around here," and pointed down the road.

"Blackwater?" we asked. "The guys who are in Iraq?"

"Yeah," said the officer. "They're all over the place."

A short while later, as we continued down Bourbon Street, we ran into the men from the car. They wore Blackwater ID badges on their arms.

"When they told me New Orleans, I said, 'What country is that in?,'" said one of the Blackwater men. He was wearing his company ID around his neck in a carrying case with the phrase "Operation Iraqi Freedom" printed on it. After bragging about how he drives around Iraq in a "State Department issued level 5, explosion proof BMW," he said he was "just trying to get back to Kirkuk (in the north of Iraq) where the real action is." Later we overheard him on his cell phone complaining that Blackwater was only paying $350 a day plus per diem. That is much less than the men make serving in more dangerous conditions in Iraq. Two men we spoke with said they plan on returning to Iraq in October. But, as one mercenary said, they've been told they could be in New Orleans for up to 6 months. "This is a trend," he told us. "You're going to see a lot more guys like us in these situations."

If Blackwater's reputation and record in Iraq are any indication of the kind of "services" the company offers, the people of New Orleans have much to fear.

Jeremy Scahill, a correspondent for the national radio and TV program Democracy Now!, and Daniela Crespo are in New Orleans. Visit www.democracynow.org for in-depth, independent, investigative reporting on Hurricane Katrina. Email: jeremy@democracynow.org

That's what the refrigeration trucks that FEMA stockpiled in Texas back in August are for. To keep the bodies preserved long enough to be sorted and then interred. They planned for this back in the days of Operation Garden Plot, Cable Splicer and REX 84. Dead slaves-I mean taxpayers are merely a nuisance to these people.

This is a non-issue from a disinformation agent who wants to excuse government excesses by saying 'it's hard work to deal with thousands of bodies.' Awww, poor statists need love too! How touching!

the way you handle thousands of bodies is to set up JUST as they were already set up to do in the beginning. they arranged space in a refrigerated warehouse in a small town north of NOLA and got refrigerated trucks and body bags and forensics people and coroners to do the IDing. the way you handle this many bodies is one at a time as they come in. as they did in NYC on 9-11. the way you handle bodies is by notifying the families as they come if you can identify them that way or with snapshots on a private website and a cross-reference database of the missing if you have to, as has been mentioned here. sad, morbid, but necessary and something we may have to face again in the future. and if you never can identify them, if they had no one, then you become their family and bury them and pray for them. the way you handle bodies is like the military is so used to doing in the many many wars we have fought. in all the horror of WWII and Vietnam and Korea and the Gulf Wars (all of them) we haven't lost forever many bodies. Bodies that had to be removed from a dangerous battle zone and shipped thousands of miles across oceans and deserts now have we? That we managed. But we can't even handle it in Louisiana? And if youre not sure HOW to handle bodies you find people who do know how. you call people in. you figure it fucking out. and the way you handle the bodies is with all the respect and dignity you can manage given the horrible situation. and you bury them with dignity no matter what too. in temporary cemetaries in the surrounding areas if you have to. the way you don't handle bodies is to leave them rotting in homes for over a week almost two or hanging on a fence or sitting against a brick wall. what the hell kind of question is this that you feel you needed to repeat it this way? are you trying to make some sort of point? i'm sorry but you asking it this way was uncool. did this answer at least a little bit of your question?

wow other anonymous...good answer as well. those refridgeration trucks were already running to that town like a week or so after the disaster. it was on the news, on video. so where are all those people?

and yeah that story is what i was referring to..the Blackwell mercenaries. $350 a day when the average marine makes what? $50 bucks before taxes. Who the hell is paying for this? Are they hiding it in the war budget? Why not!? it's not like anyone is freaking noticing.

fema is now asserting that it is costing $2 billion per day for their efforts thus far -- and the real bucks to Halliburton, et al. haven't even started rolling out of the taxpayer's pockets.

Here's an idea -- at FEMA's advertised daily price tag times just 2 weeks would equal $28 billion -- which allows another approx $30 bilion further in approved funding - take that amount and split it into two: $30 billion divided by a million people affected by the disaster would allow each of them $300,000 cash payment -- then take the other half and give it to the local governments and put the communities in charge of rebuilding their own communities and choose/bid on contractors that would do their own communities good, not Halliburton. We'd save an awful lot of money and the flood victims would not have to be "refugees." Anyone whose losses were in excess of $300,000 would have been able to afford insurance to cover the rest... and they too would be getting more "help" from this government than he (Bush) is giving his cronies.

Someone saying something nice about me is a mutual admiration society and 'wanking'?

Yesterday it was, Cassandra is a teen boy hacker, or maybe a GROUP of them. Haha, you forgot, a teen boy hacker with Multiple Personality Disorder!

Anyhoozle...take a tour of the history of the 20th Century, from the Armenian genocide through the killing fields of Cambodia to Bosnia and Rwanda, with stopoffs in Tibet and at Babi Yar, for disposing of bodies the old fashioned way, in a pit in the ground, or by burning. For technological sophistication, can't beat the Germans. (Ironically, the Germans, who left so many unmarked mass graves and turned so many people into unidentifiable ashes, kept impeccable records, with the help of IBM--see "IBM and the Holocaust: The Strategic Alliance between Nazi Germany and America's Most Powerful Corporation" by Edwin Black).

Which brings up the point that the problem isn't body disposal per se but keeping people from knowing that thousands of dead were not officially reported. Presumably while media attention was focussed on the survivors in the Superdome and the Convention Center, all those trucks full of soldiers that were toodling around could have been picking up bodies for the abovementioned trucks. And now that the military and Blackwater are in charge of the city, going house to house (and despite the court decision for CNN threatening to shoot reporters) and the water level is coming down, bodies are being collected. So far no one, no group, has as far as I know been all over the city and made an estimate of the overall death toll. You have Joe from CBS was in this part of town and saw this on Wednesday, and Sally from CNN over here on Friday, and Bob from Newsweek over there yesterday. Volunteer mortuary workers were rejected in favor of Kenyon. If an army or guard group brings in 20 bodies, are they going to know if those are not counted? Or that out of every 100 found only 1 will end up on the official list? Of course not. If a pathologist is doing autopsies round the clock, does s/he know about the ones that aren't being brought in for one? No.

Is FEMA in charge of the tally? Did you read the article in the Cleveland blog about their bumbling? Have you ever heard whether in the days when people were stuck in the Dome and the Con Center they were registered in any way? Were records kept of who got on what bus, and where that bus went? Can anyone say "Harry Smith of [address] arrived at the Dome on [date] and was there until [date] when he was bussed to a shelter in [city, state]"? If so, I have yet to read so, and I've been spending entire days doing nothing but monitoring media reports. Not only could they have lost bodies--they could have sent certain busses of survivors to be 'disappeared' rather than to a shelter.

While FEMA may be inept, the US government are pros at covert murder, e.g., The infamous United States Army School of the Americas, Fort Benning, Georgia, which "trains commissioned and non-commissioned officers from Latin American militaries. Many of its graduates have returned to their home countries and committed such atrocities as rapes, disappearances, torture, and assassination; they have organized death squads and paramilitaries to counter insurgencies and maintain power."

While the media was watching the blatantly (and perhaps deliberately) inept FEMA, were there 'death squads and paramilitaries' operating in the city?

Baron Munchausen of radio fame used to say "Vas you dere, Charley?" I vasn't dere, so I don't know what they did, and even people who were dere only knew what was going on where they were and not elsewhere. Many things could have gone on where no one was watching, or no one was comprehending what they were seeing.

Saying something could not have been done because you can't figure out how they did it is kind of silly. The whole point to doing a covert op is that there are not 7000 people all with digital camcorders standing there filming it and beaming it all over the planet on satellite TV.

co-vert [adj] secret or hidden; not openly practiced or engaged in or shown or avowed.

covert operation [noun] an intelligence operation so planned as to permit plausible denial by the sponsor.

What if Cheney wasn't "fishing in Wyoming" but directing a covert op to take care of the disposal of bodies in order to keep the official count low, and to make sure the dispersal of survivors was as chaotic as possible?

Do you think MERCENARIES ([noun] "individual soldiers of fortune who fight solely for personal gain" and btw are banned by the Geneva Convention) who make 350 bucks a day--as much as some New Orleans residents before Katrina made in a month, probably--are going to spill the beans to Geraldo? I'm sure these outfits are about as serious about OMERTA (the code of silence) as the Mafia.

My view is, if they wanted to do it, they knew how to do it, and they did it, and they did everything they could to make it impossible to prove they did it, so if I was determined to prove they did it, I would have a Herculean task ahead of me. I certainly could not do it alone from 3000 miles away sitting at a computer. I would have to be on the ground, I and many other people trained to know what to look for and not afraid to be shot while trying.

Ok, it's time for me to admit something. Over the past five years, the Bush administration has established an exemplary track record at something other than "spin" and keeping the journos in line.

They are masters at hiding dead people (see: Iraq).

First, they prohibit the media from accompanying corpse recovery efforts in New Orleans, and "ask" (well, ok, order) that pictures not be taken of the ones that were left lying around the NoLa central business district for days. Or floaters in the 9th ward. Or St. Bernard Parish. Or, well, anywhere for that matter.

Now, they're cordoning off entire sections of towns on the Gulf Coast with barbed wire...

Apparently, until the areas can be "disinfected" like Fallujah, we don't get to see what's going on:

"BLITZER: We're getting some pretty amazing video in from Long Beach, Mississippi. Joining us now on the phone CNN producer Peter Tedeschi who is covering this story for us. Peter, tell our viewers what we're seeing.

PETER TEDESCHI, CNN PRODUCER: Well Wolf, we were just Long Beach, Mississippi, west of Gulfport a few hours ago. And we're seeing barbed wire strewn across the entire length of the city about a half mile up from the Gulf of Mexico. So when it's completed, we will see about four and a half miles of rolling barbed wire by a half mile down to the water.

What security guards there are telling us is that they want to keep looters out. But what some military police told me privately was that they expect to find a lot of bodies in the area, that they're finding a debris field where very nice, middle to upper middle class homes once existed. And that they can't even get into the debris field in order to be able to find the bodies.

They are also sending out special teams with the Long Beach Fire Department in order to see if they can find cadavers amongst the ruins. I'll tell you, it's among the worst damage that I've seen in my several days now in Mississippi. And it really is a wakeup call to realize that as much as we talk about some of the road to recovery, there's a very, very long, difficult road for many, many people ahead.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/184354282X/026-2957836-6692414 is a reference to "Thunder Run: Three Days with the Tusker Brigade in the Battle of Baghdad." You may be surprised to find on a book cover that there was a battle of Baghdad when we took the city in April, 2003.

There was, and it was bloody, and it was covered up with the distraction of Private Jessica Lynch, whom the media inserted into their "coverage" (really cover-up) of the Quicksand War in Iraq at just the right time to make sure America didn't get any unpleasant ideas that US GIs were dying left and right from the Baghdad Airport to the center of Baghdad that weekend.

Ghost Troop researched and published extensively about the Battle of Baghdad Cover-up (BOBCUP). Now it looks like we're going to have to get in on the new research for the truth of BONOCUP: The Battle of New Orleans Cover-up!

Google "Captain May" and the first thing on the page will be my much-read report on BOBCUP. Regards, CPTMAY

Refugees from New Orleans behind barbed wire in UtahPosted on Wednesday, September 07

Utah's Governor Jon Huntsman has taken in some of the New Orleans refugees, at Camp Williams. Replete with barbed wire, armed soldiers with weapons at ready, police and sheriff with weapons at ready, and hell, they must surely feel right at home. In America yet. What bullshit! I'm not done with this outrage, not by a long shot. I'm actually just getting started.

The Hurricane Katrina insurgency from New Orleans is tucked safely away behind the 6-foot chain link fence with the accommodating barb wire atop chain links. The ONLY entry into Detention Camp Utah is through the highly secure military gates that are guarded by armed military guards twenty four seven.

The ONLY access to the New Orleans insurgency is granted to military, government officials, and MAINSTREAM media.

That is all I was able to ascertain when I paid Detention Camp Utah a short visit on Labor Day. Due to the escalating hostility of the military guards at the armed military gates into Detention Camp Utah, I cut my visit short and also cut my questioning of the armed military guards short. The nice chap with the shiny Colt 45 and the three stripes on his sleeve was growing moderately curt and gave me one last instruction to get away while I still could.

That's the way it is, Labor Day 2005.

Some refugees unhappy with destination

by Kirsten Stewart,Salt Lake Tribune

Sept. 5, 2005

Jervis Bergeron lost his home to Hurricane Katrina. He lost his dignity looting for food and water. He lost track of his family in the chaos that ensued as rescuers evacuated New Orleans.

Now he has lost his bearings. knew where Utah was, but nobody told me that's where we were going. Nothing personal. It's nice. But I don't know anybody here," said Bergeron, among the first batch of 152 evacuees to arrive at the Camp Williams Utah Army National Guard training site.

Like others who arrived in smaller military planes, Bergeron wasn't told where he was headed when he boarded the JetBlue airliner Saturday at the Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport. In fact, great pains were taken to keep their destination secret.

National Guard officials asked a reporter and photographer aboard two separate military planes not to identify their news organizations or tell the refugees where the planes were going. They explained some refugees on earlier flights complained or refused evacuation when told where they were going.

~Sometimes you need more than faith, you need action. Positive, compassionate action. The world has always been evil. I don't believe that God in is anyway active in our affairs - he neither protects or punishes - he just creates.

We can pray but we need more - we must act. One antidote to evil is communication. Hence, my previous observation. If we truly care, we have to reach out and touch those who are isolated and suffering great injustices. Then they are no longer alone or afraid.

~In the meantime, I have hunted for ways to find a way to write letters to these inmates - no luck so far. So I wrote a note to Anderson Cooper and PBS to keep an eye on this story. It's important especially when one takes into account the story of

the BLACKWATCH SS Troops now stationed in NO!

~btw. You are wise and compassionate. We must take care of our own. But no, our administration is too busy worrying about nuclear weapons to take any notion for human being. God have mercy.

http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/evan/25229/

~~I've been to Falls Creek, as a teenager, although I am not and have never been

Baptist.It's impossible to get anything in or out of there unless you're part mountain goat, or a very determined teenager, who'll go through anything to get what you're after ...

It's likely, from what I'm hearing from folks at home, that communications are being censored. You may try, but don't hold your breath.

~I have spent this Lord's Day reading the news...and I want to weep. And I am scared. What kind of world are we living in? Has it always been this evil? Well, for those without a daddy. What does the scripture say? The Lord will protect the widow and the fatherless...

What a time to have to rely on one's faith. These poor souls is right. I am in shock at these times. Utter shock. God help.

~COMMUNICATIONS on Sep 9, 2005 6:45 AM

Isolation. That is an excellent move by FEMA. So what I would like to know is if the local churches could set up a webpage so we can send snail-mail letters to these poor inmates. If they won't let these people out then it is our responsibility to let them know that they are not forgotten. That for the next 5 or 6 months, we are thinking of them. We have to set up a communications link between these innocent inmates and ourselves. IS THIS POSSIBLE?

~Yes, there are - I'm originally from Oklahoma, so called the folks back home, including relatives in the military.. This is authentic, and the camp's on lockdown.

The people being taken there are, essentially, interned, without charge, for the next 5 months, or, I hear (and I'm PRAYING it's a joke), until they sign up for the National Guard so they can be shipped to Iraq.

The other day, I wrote about Katrina evacuees being taken to Utah with no prior knowledge of their destination, and that they were reportedly being kept behind barbed wire.......

And then there is that report I have noted in recent days of the 1,000 evacuees flown to Roosevelt Roads naval base on Puerto Rico's eastern tip. What of them?

Please send questions to http://www.Congress.org/ and media:

Why are Evacuees Being Sent to Puerto Rico Against Their Will?The Katrina Evacuees are being treated like POWs behind fences, not allowed to leave with heavy military guard. Please investigate and help these survivors of Katrina who are being treated like Gitmo detainees. They haven't committed any crime! The following article has a photograph of two very unhappy, oppressed and worn looking women behind orange fence.......

http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/fema.html

I just got back from a FEMA Detainment CampI'm extremely depressed to report that things seem to only be getting sadder concerning the people so devastatingly affected by Katrina last week.

Re: the rebuttal story, it always cracks me up that some of the same people who have no trouble snarking at a Bush or Cheney or Chertoff lie will take at face value a post that turns up on a blog with by some 'official', while subjecting a post from an ordinary citizen to the third degree.

Ed Kostiuk, who wrote the rebuttal, was a Marine for THIRTY YEARS. His title is ""Certified Safety Officer, Emergency Management Coordinator" with the Oklahoma State Department of Health. Translation: he's an EMT, a paramedic. He's not just with OSDH, either, that's a bit disingenuous, he's actually with Oklahoma State Health Department Terrorism and Preparedness Division. His bio says he "provides technical assistance and training for many advanced disciplines for search and rescue."

Now, there is absolutely NO chance that an lifelong Marine trained in anti-terrorism search techniques would be in any way a person who could get himself involved in working at something that amounts to a detainment or concentration camp. Nor would he defend his government's policies publicly because that is part of his job, to make it all look like nothing to worry about. That is simply not in the realm of possibility, is it? Ex Marines don't take "Semper fidelis" ("always faithful") as LITERAL or anything.

I hope Valhalla, who made the original post, will come here as well as to Above Top Secret so we can ask her what she thinks of this rebuttal.

My guess is it works something like this. The information analyst makes a list of the liberal-leaning blogs and assigns them their monitor(s). Just like the fortyesque crew cut dudes who go online pretending to be 13 year old girls in order to trap Internet pedophiles, they are trained in certain techniques. When they see a particular post or discussion or poster that needs to be squashed, they run their playbook of diversion, discrediting, divisiveness--the hardcore UFOlogists and conspiracy researchers are familiar with these techniques, but the massive influx of ordinary joes and janes into the blogosphere means lots of people who aren't. So they're going to have a certain success ending promising discussions, driving a wedge among people who would otherwise be allies, even causing entire sites to implode due to infighting. When all else fails they may bring down the board itself--I was on a literary discussion EZ board when the massive failure occurred and I always wondered which board(s) were the real targets of the attack that in some cases destroyed years of posts.

If they see an article with a local angle, like the Oklahoma story by Valhalla, they can send someone who is a 'real person'--like Jason van Steenwyk, the origin of the "FEMA did just fine" story that was picked up by the columnist and spread on the winger sites like Wizbang, or good old Ed Kostiuk in Oklahoma--to issue some disinformation, misinformation, gaslighting, and other forms of mindfuck and bullshit (which by the way sounds like a Republican law or lobbying firm, no?) under some low level official cover (Van Steenwyk is in the Florida National Guard.)

Now I don't mean this to insult Valhalla--but another play is the one that caught Dan Rather: that the original post/article critical of BushCo is a fake, so that once all the left-leaning blogs spread it and many people give it credence they can hop in and say "Hey look, here are photos and ordinary citizens attesting this is just a nice little church camp! These lefties are nothing but tinfoilhatters who hate Murka!" So that when the REAL reports start coming in, officialdom and the righties can say while twirling their index fingers at their temples, "Oh yeah sure, these are concentration camps, just like that nice little church camp in Bumfuck, Egypt last week!"

Now here is what I've always thought OUR side should do, which is the same thing. Instead of doing what lefties usually do when they go to a rightwing blog, which is immediately pipe up and get banned, have our own observers and run some of the subversion tactics back on them. Believe me, from my few visits to the Land of the Freepers, there are some real knucklewalkers there, racist yobs who want wifey barefoot and preggers, who would be a snap to pull psyops capers on.

Of course, I always end up thinking about that Al Pacino movie, "Cruising", in which the undercover cop got so into his role he wasn't sure anymore who he was, or (here's an obscure book, may even by O/P, but one everyone should read to understand the Alice in Wonderland world of intelligence operatives) "A Dandy in Aspic" in which a British agent is assigned by the ordered to kill a Russian mole who is actually...himself. (This was made into a 1968/ film with Laurence Harvey, who also played the original Manchurian candidate; I have never seen it, most reviews say it's a muddle despite a good cast--Tom Courtenay, Mia Farrow, Lionel Stander and Peter Cook inter alia. But having read the book I would say it would be a challenge to translate the book's claustrophobic sense of encroaching doom as the agent tries to extricate himself from the trap in one piece.

"Was the carpenter who constructed Christ's cross concievably named Joseph?"~Alexander Eberlin/Krasnevin, antihero of "A Dandy in Aspic" by Derek Marlowe